Tehran to name street after Mirzakhani

Tehran Municipality may name a street or place after the late Iranian math genius Maryam Mirzakhani, an official affiliated to Tehran Municipality has said.

Head of Tehran City’s ‘Planning and Study Center’ Babak Negahdari says he has suggested the naming plan to Tehran Municipality.

He also noted that naming a place or street after the late scientist helps the young generation to remember the winner of the Fields Medal (AKA Nobel Prize of mathematics).

Naming a street after her can promote national confidence and encourage spirit of research among the Iranian youth, Negahdari added.

A large number of national and international figures and scientific institutes, including UNESCO, President Hassan Rouhani, UN officials, and several Iranian ministers have paid tribute and issued condolence messages on Mirzakhani’s death at the age of 40.

Born in 1977 in Tehran, Mirzakhani won gold medals at the International Mathematical Olympiad (Hong Kong, 1994) and the International Mathematical Olympiad (Canada, 1995).

She received a BS in mathematics from Iran’s prestigious Sharif University of Technology in 1999 and then went to the US where she earned her PhD degree from Harvard University in 2004.

In 2008, the math-wiz became full professor of mathematics at Stanford University at the age of 31.

Mirzakhani received the Blumenthal Award from the American Mathematical Society in 2009, the Ruth Lyttle Satter Prize in Mathematics in 2013, and the Clay Research Award in 2014.

The most important part of her achievements was her 2014 Fields Medal, viewed as the highest honor a mathematician can receive, which is given every four years to mathematicians under the age of 40. She won the prize in recognition of her contributions to the understanding of the symmetry of curved surfaces.

MG/AI